Crocker: U.s. Favors Black Majority Rule

March 13, 1986|By Washington Post

WASHINGTON — A senior State Department official said Wednesday that the Reagan administration favors black majority rule in South Africa and regards members of the militant black African National Congress as ''freedom fighters'' in their battle against the white apartheid regime.

Testifying before the House Foreign Affairs subcommittee on Africa, Assistant Secretary of State Chester Crocker was asked by its chairman, Rep. Howard Wolpe, D-Mich., whether the administration supported ''the creation of a system based on black majority rule and the protection of white minority rights.''

''Yes,'' replied Crocker, who is regarded as the architect of the administration's constructive engagement policy toward South Africa, an effort to encourage reform of the white minority apartheid system.

Wolpe and his aides said this was the first time any high-ranking administration official has publicly endorsed black majority rule in South Africa in five years of testimony before the subcommittee. However, a State Department spokesman said former U.N. Ambassador Jeane Kirkpatrick had endorsed the principle in South Africa in August 1984.

At another point, Crocker also said the administration regards the ANC's guerrillas, who have been battling South African whites for years, as ''freedom fighters in the generic sense.''

While administration officials have previously urged Pretoria to release imprisoned ANC leader Nelson Mandela, none has ever publicly referred to the guerrillas as ''freedom fighters,'' a term usually reserved by the administration for anti-communist rebels in Angola, Nicaragua and Afghanistan. Crocker said that it was clear that 1986 would be a ''decisive year.''